Yes the San Diego market can be a tough one to get started in, if you decide to invest out of state choose cities in safe and economically diversified areas with above-average income and population growth.

For those of you who care about the broad economic outlook in your investment areas, here's the recent economics report from this month. http://www.jec.senate.gov/public/_cache/files/b2fb1607-cbaa-4d20-871f-c58170cbf5c0/jec-state-economic-snapshots-september-2016.pdfIf that link doesn't go through, google for 'senate state economic snapshot September 2016' and you'll probably find it.

The barrier is not technological capability - there are 10s of thousands such buildings in Europe {search on Passivhaus} - but lack of will (economic and political).Equally important, and potentially more difficult problem to solve, is retrofitting of existing building stock to achieve significant energy use reductions in a cost effective manner.  

I had that freedom before the financial crisis as I was self employed making great money, no boss or schedule.

Both of these markets seem very attractive and especially resistant to overall economic downturns.

But, typically I've noticed many of the residential buyers base their purchase on their needs and can let their emotions get the best of them.Both require you to act in the best interest of your client, but there is much more black and white on the commercial side where numbers really drive investment sales pricing and can be influenced by micro and macro economic factors.If I were fresh out of college and living at home I'd get started on the commercial sales side.

It's just economics.2.

I am also very interested in understanding if the above can be done in states where I do not reside because the economics in the state that I do live in (NJ) are not good in accomplishing the above objective.

Many forecasters predict a shift to more CA normal market barring some international crisis that is.

Fresno seems to have decent cash flowing multi family properties (at least on paper)  Thanks, yes Fresno is also high on murder rates and low on economic development, so be careful and do your research.Personally, long-term I still like Oakland and the East Bay, but I believe these markets peaked late last year and prices are currently flattening or are on the way down...your timing is critical.Here's the current cycle for MultiFamily, that shadows SFR most closely: